starting a blog

What is WordPress?

WordPress is a blog publishing platform that makes creating and maintaining a website or blog so easy anyone can do it. It is the most popular blogging system on the Internet. WordPress is used by nearly 20% of the Alexa’s top 1 million websites and manages 22% of all new websites.

WordPress.org vs. WordPress.com: What’s the difference?

The difference in a nutshell is that the dot org version requires you to have your own hosting, which costs money, you can have your own domain name that you own (ex. angiemjordan.com as opposed to angiemjordan.wordpress.com), and you essentially have full control of your site to do what you want with. Dot org is the blogging software, dot com is the blogging host.

The dot com version is a blog hosted on WordPress servers and is a little more limited as far as plugins, customization, and publishing. The benefits of going with the dot com is that is practically impossible for you to muck it up. It’s also a great way of testing the waters before you jump in and invest money ( although the cost of a self hosted blog is nominal at best).

3 BIG reasons why you should be using WordPress

Easiest publishing tool available for blogs

WordPress is designed to be easy for even those who are just starting a blog and have no website/web design or publishing experience. Choosing a WordPress theme and customizing colors and design is also fairly easy to do. Trust me, if this is something that I could do, on my own, then anyone can do it. Their are also plugins available(in the dot org version only) that help to create a more dynamic and interactive site.

Great SEO value

16% of the top 1 million traffic ranked websites by Alexa are run by WordPress and that number is growing fast. Wordpress was create with SEO in mind. Search engines can easily crawl and identify what the content is about because of the way WordPress is designed.

Easy to design and customize

From changing colors, to total customization- WordPress is super easy to make your own. You can use a Framework such as Thesis, Genesis, or Headway (the top 3 in my opinion) and choose from themes they offer, or even hire someone to fully customize your site which is much cheaper than building a site from the ground up.

To learn more about WordPress visit WordPress.com or WordPress.org . To learn more about blogging, SEO, and using social media to gain more exposure for your blog and make your website more visible in search meet me in your inbox. It’s easy. Sign up below.Join the community! It only takes a second, and it’s FREE!

The bottom line is that blogging is like sex. You can’t fake it. You can’t fake passion. You can’t fake wanting to engage with the public. If you do, it will ultimately become an unsatisfying experience for the blogger and their readers. – Kevin Anderson

What Is Blogging?

There are over 150 Million blogs out there on the Internet and they continue to grow in both volume and value. Blogging comes from the term “web log” and is like an online diary. A blog is characterized by frequently updated “posts”.

A blog post is an article about a particular topic ranging anywhere from 300-1000 words. People blog about everything from cooking to politics to social media. It’s as easy as saying what’s on your mind, or informing people about currents events, or even sharing your favorite recipe.

There really is no right or wrong way to blog. However, depending on your blogging goals and reasons for starting a blog there are rights ways to accomplish what you are setting out to achieve through blogging and make your website more visible.

Starting a blog is super simple these days which is one of the contributing factors for the large volume of blogs on the Internet. There are 31% more bloggers than there were 3 years ago. There are great publishing platforms such as WordPress(my personal fav), Typepad, LiveJournal, and Blogger that make blog publishing really easy.

Why Blog?

To really answer the question, “what is blogging” you have to umderstand the purpose of a blog. A blog can serve several purposes:

blogging for business

There are those blogs that exist soley to help promote and sell a businesses products and services and generate more traffic to a company’s website increasing lead generation and conversions.

In order for businesses to be more visible online, they’ve had to adjust their marketing strategies to include blogging and SoCal media.

personal blog

Some people just have a lot to say. My first blog was just an online diary. I shared my dating stories and life experinces with the world,grew a community, and made connections that will last forever.

Some people like to share their experiences with others to help them or keep them from making the same mistakes as they have in life. Personal blogs are very popular on the Internet.

when blogging is your business

Blogging can be your business, meaning you can make money blogging, from your blog, and from any products or services you sell on your blog. This is tricky and there is no exact science to how much money you can make, but lots of people have made blogging their business.

Bottom line is blogging can be a vehicle to get more exposure for your business, help you connect and make new friends online, become a second source of income for your and your family, turn your passion into money… it can open doors for you that you would have never dreamed.

Starting a blog and want to know more? Then sign up to receive tips on blogging, SEO, and content development below. Let me help you discover the why, teach you the how, and get you the traffic to make your blog a success. Meet you in your inbox!

Creating a content development strategy will help to hone in on what message you are trying to convey to your readers, and will help you to create content that will boost your blog traffic, make your blog laser-focused, and keep readers on your site longer. This is a great thing to do when first starting a blog or years into your blog and you can create a content development strategy for a week, a month, a quarter, or even a year.

It’s completely up to you.

Why you should develop a content strategy for your blog

Boost your blog traffic

With a content strategy in place, your content will be laser-focused and you will not only be consistent, which will help your traffic, but you will have well thought out posts that will be keyword rich and seo friendly. The better your blog posts get, the more they will get shared naturally. Trust that this will boost your traffic and make your website more visible.

Not all traffic is created equal. Well thought out content that is designed to serve a purpose will bring targeted traffic that converts. Meaning, you will get the audience that you are trying to get (those ready to buy) and they will find just what they are looking for on your site, and are more likely to become a part of your community.

Clear focus on goals

When blogging it is so easy to loose track of what you are trying to accomplish from each and every article you write. Each and every article you write should serve a specific purpose. Creating an editorial calendar helps with keeping focused too.

In your content development strategy you should know what you are going to write about, why you are going to write it (what purpose it’s going to serve for you and your audience) and what you want people to do who arrive at your blog. This will help you develop great SEO for your blog.

Higher conversions

Planning your content and having a strategy will help your conversion rate. Firstly, because you will know what you are measuring. If you are blogging without a clear purpose, then you are most likely not results oriented. Your blog should be focused on results. Knowing what you want your content to do is the first step in creating higher conversions.

Want to know more about creating a content strategy? Download your free content development worksheet HERE

One of the first things you have to decide when starting a blog is choosing the right hosting plan. If you are anything like I was starting out, you had absolutely no clue how to do this. Chances are you opened up Google, typed in “what is hosting” and hoped for the best. Well I’m glad you landed here because not only will I explain what hosting is, but walk you through choosing the right hosting plan for you.

What does hosting mean exactly?

Have you ever rented an apartment? Well, hosting is much the same type of landlord/renter relationship. You are basically paying to keep your files on someone else’s server. Like owning the trailer but renting the land on which it sits.

A server is the computer hardware that provides World Wide Web services on the Internet, a Web server includes the hardware, operating system, server software, TCP/IP protocols and the Web site content. Web servers process requests from Browsers for web pages and serves them up via HTTP.

And that is the plain english version of what hosting is. If you want to know more techy stuff like what an http and url is check it out here.

What are my options?

First you have to find a hosting company. I am sure you’ve heard of some of the more popular ones such as GoDaddy or Host Gator, but there are endless options out there available right there at your fingertips you can search for local providers or go with the big names.

I’ve always used GoDaddy for hosting and here’s why

Two words: CUSTOMER SUPPORT

I’ve been using GoDaddy for years and I can only recall one or two times where I have called and had someone not be able to really help me with my problem (in which case I would hang up and call back hoping for a different tech). Even the most silly, simple things that I probably should know, I can call and they are alway happy to assist me. 24hrs a day 7 days a week. Kudos. I’m sorry, but this reason alone trumps all others. I am a loyal follower, I will never switch.

That being said, let’s continue.

Picking the right plan: What you need and what you can live without

Let’s just say you decided to go with GoDaddy hosting. Great! Let me walk you through it. Follow this link–>Blog Hosting at GoDaddy.com And it will take you to a page like the one you see in the screenshot below. They will have the “deluxe” plan highlighted for you. Chances are, if you are just starting to blog, are not really selling anything directly from your blog (yet), you don’t need the deluxe hosting. the economy hosting plan has plenty of space for you. Remember, you can always upgrade to more space and a more extensive package if needed. And really, unless you are selling something from your site, you don’t need an SSL (if you call GoDaddy, they will tell you as much).

Choosing a hosting plan is really that simple. But don’t get sucked into getting more than what you need. You can always call the folks over at GoDaddy, they are extremely helpful and never try to sell you things you don’t need. Got questions? Leave them in the comments. I am happy to help you through this process and don’t forget to check out Starting A Blog: Choosing Your Domain Name

The first thing you need to know about writing an about me section of your blog is this:

It’s not about you!

I could end the post right there, but I’ll continue for 500 words’ sake. Most people think when they set out to write an about me page that it has to be well… all about them. But I challenge you to think differently about this for a while. In all honesty, why are people coming to your blog? What was their purpose in searching for what you are offering?

It’s about them!

They are searching for answers to their problems. It all comes back to them. Not you. It’s about providing solutions. And if you ever want to make money blogging, solutions is what you will need!

So how do write an effective about me section but still keeping “them” in mind?

3 Components Of A Killer About Me Section

1. Be conversational, not stuffy or “professional”

Be yourself. If it is just you, then say it is just you. You don’t have to pretend like “we” have services when it’s just you. Being authentic is very important because your readers will relate to your “realness”. They will say, “hey, this chick is not all different from me and she did, so can I”. Your about me section is the perfect place to be yourself and capture your audience.

A brief intro into you who are is necessary but remember to quickly bring it back to them. No one really wants to know what kind of food you like, or how many dogs you have, or how many miles you can run… save it. They want to know why you are relevant to their problem they are trying to solve-PERIOD.

If you must ramble on, link to another page that tells more about yourself. I did that before in a previous blog where I created a post titled “25 Random Things You Didn’t Know About Me”. For those who really wanted to know, got their fill, but meanwhile I kept my about page to the point.

Focus on how your skills will solve the problem that they have, why they should trust or believe in you, and what they will gain from your product, services, or your information on the blog.

3. Leave them with a call to action and a specific next step

Tell them what to do next. Invite them to sign up for your emails. Lead them to a series of posts that will keep them browsing around the site for a while. Do both. Give them a next step. Now they know how you can help them, prompt them on to what’s next. Always leave links to your content from your about page.

There’s so much to learn when starting a blog and writing your about me can be one of the most crucial pages of your static content. Don’t forget to still consider SEO and use your keywords.

If you are just starting a blog, or just want more tips on blogging, the best way to stay up to date is to sign up below to receive my emails. Don’t worry I won’t spam, and trust me, you will become a better blogger from it.

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Are you in the beginning stages of starting a blog and haven’t picked your domain name or hosting yet? Well, great! You are in the right place. I will guide you through the process and hopefully help you to make your decision easier and well, fun too.

So here’s what you really, really need to know about choosing your domain name -fluff free.

Choosing your domain name: what to consider

Your domain name doesn’t always have to be the name of your blog

No, your domain name doesn’t always have to be the name of your blog, but it should be. Whenever possible, make the two the same.

Make it as easy and memorable as possible

Short, sweet, and memorable. Try to eliminate special characters such as dashes and underscores. You want it to be easy for people to find you.

Make it relevant, but leave room to grow

Depending on your industry and how much of a niche you are in, you may want to consider not being too specific. For example while setting up my social media management company I wanted to steer away from using the words “social media” in the URL. Why? Because, though social media is great business, my end goal is to expand services that include graphics, marketing plans, and website design. The social media seemed limiting to me. Get it?

Make sure it doesn’t spell something funny

In one of my more recent business I polled my friends for great business names. I was running into the problem that every great name I came up with, the URL was already taken. Trust me that can get very frustrating. My friend recommended that I just abbreviate the name of the business. It spelled g-u-s… GUS… what in the world would a social media marketing company be doing with a URL that was someone’s name? Exactly.

Make sure that your business name all jumbled together doesn’t spell something ridiculous or profane. I’ve seen it happen and I always wonder if the owner knows they are cursing everyone with their domain. 🙂

The dot com debate

Originally .com was meant to classify what type of website you were visiting. Com standing for commercial. This original idea was not enforced and there are so many top level domains that are unrestricted such as .net, .org, and .biz.

Does it all really matter? I like the dot com. Can you have a dot net site that indexes just as well in search-yes, you can. Your extension has nothing to do with your search engine rankings. So why do I like the dot com? Because it’s easy and memorable( remember?). And the simpler you can keep it, the better.

Jump in there!

I find the best way to get the ball rolling is to just jump in. To sit behind your desk and dream up the perfect URL will do you no good if you haven’t even checked to see what is available. Go ahead and open up GoDaddy.com and try some different names out in the domain search tool on the front page. They will even give you some suggested domains based on what you searched for.

Choosing a domain name is one of the fun aspects of starting a blog but it is crucial that you choose something that you can live with for quite some time. Hope this helps and as always if you guys have any other suggestions to add please do so in the comments.Domain Sale! $7.99 .com at GoDaddyFor free tips and internet marketing savvy+love sign up below and you can have them delivered straight to your inbox!